Gran Torino, Only You, Taken: films on TV today

Clint Eastwood gets angry in Detroit, Marisa Tomei goes gooey-eyed in Venice and Liam Neeson shows off his very particular set of skills in Paris: the RadioTimes team’s pick of free-to-air films on TV today

This is by no means the best film in Clint Eastwood’s impressive CV but it’s still well worth watching. Clint plays an elderly and recently widowed car worker, a war veteran, an ardent patriot and a racist, who looks upon the world around him and doesn’t like any of it, especially the South-East Asians who are his neighbours. His most prized possession is a 1972 Ford Gran Torino, which he had helped to build and which the shy teenage boy next door, Bee Vang, is bullied into stealing as his initiation into a gang. The kid is caught in the act by Eastwood, who is ready to shoot him but doesn’t. Instead this meeting turns out to be life-changing for both of them. Eastwood’s performance is excellent, both at the beginning when he exudes loathing and ill-concealed rage and later, as his developing relationship with the boy makes him realise that nobody is too old to change and become a better person.